The Struggle to Survive
by AquaRaptor
Summary: A red pikmin gets left behind by his Onion. Feeling that his existence is pointless without it, he goes on a quest to track it down. But once he encounters other stray pikmin, he discovers that Onion life may not have been so gratifying after all...
1. Sunset

I was lying in a patch of grass, letting the blades cushion my body as I stared at the sky. My friend, another red pikmin, was right beside me. He began to speak.

"What do you think those clouds are made of?"

"Beats me," I replied.

"They looks like large chunks of snow..." he mused.

"Well, that might explain why snow falls out of the sky every year."

However, I quickly saw fault in my own theory.

"No, that couldn't be it. Snow doesn't turn grey, and the clouds are grey sometimes," I corrected myself.

"Now that you mention it, they seem to always be there when it rains."

"What're you getting at?"

"I think... I think they're the spirits of past pikmin, gathering in the sky to rain water and give us good fortune."

"Water kills us, though..."

"I guess that means they're the spirits of blue pikmin," he joked. We both chuckled.

Afterwards, we were silent for a long period. As the time crawled by, I slowly closed my eyes and dozed off...

...

"Move!"

I stirred groggily at his voice.

"What...?

"MOVE!"

Reality hit me like a rock as something grabbed onto my stem and dragged me high into the air. I looked down and saw my friend lying face down, struggling to get to his feet. It had then occurred to me that he had to jump to get out of the way.

Wiggling my arms and feet, my eyes shifted to my abductor. I couldn't see much, but it was a creature that flew by some wings on its head. I'd seen them before, but never thought them to be dangerous...

Scared for my life, I furiously struggled to get loose and screamed for help. My eyes fell back to the ground below and I saw my friend trying to give chase, but having a mere bud, he was falling behind. He was shouting something at me, but I couldn't hear him. Soon enough, he was out of sight.

A horrible feeling surged through my stomach as the creature swooped under a branch, crossing over a small stream and past a tree stump at high speed. Then, it gradually slowed to a stop...

I held still, keeping my eyes fixated on its head. I hung there, waiting miserably for it to eat me and end my life. I just hoped it would be quick...

And then, in an instant, it swung me upwards and threw me straight down. All I remember is seeing the ground getting closer and closer before I blacked out...

...

I don't know how long it had been. I couldn't have known. I had been unconscious, merely drifting in a sea of black.

The problem was that when I awoke, I was _still _in a sea of black. I tried to wiggle. No success. Arms? Stuck. Legs? Stuck.

I tried moving my stem, and thankfully that was met with success. There was no mistaking it. I had been buried.

I sighed internally. I probably should've been grateful that I didn't become a meal, but now I was stuck with no means of escape. And there was no telling how long I'd have to stay like this.

I just remained in the soil, waiting. Eventually, my bud bloomed into a flower. That was a plus, I suppose. I flexed my stem to see if I could check the outside conditions. The temperature had dropped from before.

I continued to sway my stem back and forth. It was all I was capable of doing. At one point, something approached and came into contact with my stem, but disappointingly, it left. Must've been some beast in the forest. I flexed my stem to feel the temperature again. There was a slight breeze. It was very welcoming. I wished I was above ground to fully experience it.

Then, I felt something grab a hold of my stem.

I felt one tug, but I was still firmly rooted in place. I felt another, and it dislodged me slightly.

The last and final heave pulled me out of the ground. With a dizzying sensation, I did a flip through the air and landed unsteadily on my feet. I looked to see who my rescuer was.

It was my friend from before.

"It's you!" I cried, happier to see him than I had ever been.

"I had been looking for you ever since that thing took you away. I thought it would've eaten you by now."

I have always been glad he said that. Most pikmin wouldn't have gone through that kind of effort for another, especially for one that was presumed dead.

"Say, how long has it been anyway?"

He looked as if he was at a loss.

"I... don't know. I had been searching so long I lost track of ti-"

He stopped. A disconcerting look crossed his face. I realized why when I turned my attention to the sky.

It was orange.


	2. Nightfall

I can't say much about what happened directly after by memory, because I wasn't thinking. All I knew is that I had to run, run back to the Onion, or else my existence as a pikmin would be ruined.

We both ran, faster than we had ever run before, but with each burst of speed, the distance seemed greater and greater

My red friend had to lead the way as only he knew how to get back from where we were. Sporting my new flower, I could easily outrun him, but doing so would obviously worsen my situation. I felt so restricted having to stay behind...

Sooner or later, my friend started to jump for joy as he kept moving. I looked over his shoulder.

It was the Onion, still standing firmly in place.

Unable to control my enthusiasm, I hurried past him.

_I couldn't believe I had almost been left behind..._

It was right across from me.

_Sanctuary..._

I could make out some other red pikmin crawling up the stilts.

_Almost there..._

**Boom**

I tripped over something that started squirming its way out of the ground. I fell hard and rolled onto my back. Shaking off my momentary vision blur, I looked up and saw a legless, winged monstrosity with large jaws crawling its way towards me.

"I can outrun it," I thought to myself as I sprang to my feet and started to make my escape...

...Only to have another one burst out from underneath me.

As I collapsed onto its smooth carapace, the world around me seemed to be falling apart as at least three more of them started breaking out of the dirt, bits of soil flying everywhere.

The creature beneath me twisted its body left and right, trying to get me off its back. I held on for dear life.

In the corner of my eye, I saw my friend running back and forth across from the madness.

"Stop trying to help me! Get back to the Onion before it takes off!" I shouted.

He didn't go anywhere.

"Go! Now! There's nothing you can do for m- OOF!"

The creature suddenly took flight, taking me by surprise and leaving me dangling over its side. It was easier to view my surroundings now and my friend was running back to the Onion.

I was glad. I didn't need anyone making any needless sacrifices for me.

Acting on impulse, I hauled myself onto the creatures back and grabbed one of its wings to inhibit its flight. It quickly lost control and spiraled downwards, crashing into another one. The impact sent me off its back, but luckily I was able to break my fall with my hands. The sounds of hungry crawlers churned from behind me, so I got up and made a break for it, towards the Onion...

...And was met with a wave of dust.

Briefly covering my face, I saw the propeller spinning, blowing a strong wind that shook my flower...

And in what felt like a mere instant, it was out of reach and slowly shrinking in the sky.

I stared at it blankly. There went... There went my livelihood. What was I to do now?

Then, reality hit me again. I heard the wretched crawling again.

I had forgotten all about them.

I spun around and saw a pair of mandibles right before me, ready to close on my body and end my now meagre existence. There wasn't time to do anything but close my eyes...

Suddenly, I felt something tug me away as the creature's mouth shut mere inches before my face. I turned around...

It was my friend.

There were a lot of things I wanted to say, but that would have to wait. Survival came first.

"Come on!" I shouted, running past him. We both headed for the trees, knowing there was no chance of those crawlers keeping up with us.

We dashed through a grove of ferns and stopped to look back. There was nothing.

"We lost them," he said triumphantly.

"Don't celebrate yet. We still need to find shelter befor-"

Our stems stiffened in alarm as the ferns rustled loudly. In a heartbeat, the crawlers burst out from the foliage, having taken flight.

I hadn't even realized I had already started running again, trying to escape the mad flapping of wings behind me. I couldn't see my friend, but I knew he was falling behind.

"Hey!" he hollered, as though he had suddenly realized something.

"This is the area I explored this morning!"

"So what?"

"I know where we can go! Head for that tree over there!"

I had nothing to gain from questioning him, so I reluctantly obeyed and made my way to the tree. Mercifully, it wasn't far and I swiftly reached the trunk.

"What do we do now?" I called out to him. No response.

Not good.

I looked back and saw that he had tripped over a root and the crawlers were homing in on him.

I ran back to my friend and grabbed his arm just as a crawler landed sloppily behind him. It opened its mouth to strike...

Letting instinct take over, I threw him backwards just in time for the strike to miss. He made a tiny plop when he hit the ground as I drove my flower into the crawler's head. It flinched and tried to bite me, but I jumped over its maw and clung to its back, striking it repeatedly. Rearing upwards, it took flight and left me to tumble onto the ground.

I saw then that the others had completely surrounded me, and my friend was nowhere to be seen.

I wasn't scared, though. Once a pikmin's fight reaction kicks in, it's never afraid to die, even if it's a losing battle.

All I knew was that I was going to either fight my way through, or go down swinging.

Then, in unison, the crawlers all reared up...

...And suddenly burrowed into the ground.

What had just happened?

I realized almost a second too late. I scurried forward to avoid a huge mouth that came thundering to the ground. The creature immediately got back up, growling in frustration.

I surveyed my adversary, though I already knew what I was up against. The eye stalks, the red coloration, and the unforgettable white spots...

The Spotted Demon.

"Hey! Come this way!"

I heard my friend shout that from behind me. I looked to see where he was, but he was out of sight, so I followed his voice. The Demon's feet stomped menacingly as it gave chase.

"I'm in here!"

I saw it then. There was a crevice in a root, close to where it connected with the tree, and judging by appearance, it was only wide enough for a pikmin to fit through.

I had to be careful, though. The Demon was slower than me, but if I tripped even once, it would easily make up the lost ground.

I caught a break, though. In my rush, I disturbed a nearby Green Beetle and it scuttled away. As much as I wanted to chase after it, I ignored it and continued on my way. The beetle served me well, because it caught the Demon's full attention and became its new target.

Finally, after such a painful struggle, I made my way into the crevice. It was a bit cramped, and my flower nearly touched the ceiling, but it would have to do.

My friend was overjoyed.

"You made it!"

I, on the other hand, was not.

"Why did you stay behind?" I asked a bit more aggressively than I had intended. It didn't phase him, though.

"I wasn't about to leave you here all alone."

"But you could've gotten killed!"

"You're right. But if I didn't do it, you'd probably be food by now. And we're both still alive and safe, aren't we?"

I didn't have a retort. I was still very displeased with him. Yet, he had my eternal gratitude as even if I had found shelter, I would've suffered all alone.

I took a deep breath.

"You know you basically threw your purpose away for my sake, right?"

His air of optimism suddenly faded.

"...I guess so," he muttered as he sat down. I sat too.

"When it's daytime again, we can go looking for the Onion," he suggested almost apologetically.

"To what purpose? The Onion lands in a different spot each day. It was only yesterday we were in a snowy forest, remember? It may be many, many days before it lands in this exact area again, or even anywhere nearby."

"So what are you saying then?"

"We may as well forget about Onion life," I stated bluntly, aware of my own cynicism.

"You don't even want to bother trying?"

"No."

"Okay, so what would you prefer, then? That we live alone in this forest, with completely useless lives?"

"Well, I wouldn't..."

"That's all that's in store for us if we don't get back to the Onion."

I was growing slightly frustrated.

"What do you mean 'if'? What are the chances of-"

"They're very small. But wouldn't you rather try and fail than not try at all? We may not find the Onion ever again, but there's still a chance, and we have nothing to lose. So it has to be worth a shot."

I sighed loudly. I knew it would be a rough journey, and it would most likely be in vain, but...

"...You're right. Whatever effort we go through will probably be all for naught, but we have nothing to lose and everything to gain from trying. We'll start in the morning," I resigned.

He stared at me for a moment.

"Thanks."

I settled down to sleep. He did likewise.

"Oh, and one last thing..." I said.

"Yes?" he responded.

"Since we're going on this crazy search, promise me you'll at least give it your best, because I really do want to find the Onion."

"I will," he said reassuringly.

"Remember, I haven't forgetten what every pikmin knows. A life that isn't serving the Onion is an empty one."

Little did I know that I would grow to deeply resent that belief...


	3. Found

**Sorry about the mishap from earlier, everyone. Here's the real chapter 3.**

I woke with a stiff back.

The floor felt hard... Why was that?

Then it came back to me...

I had spent the night inside a tree's root.

The next few minutes felt like a fantasy. But with each passing second, my grip on reality was returning, and I didn't like it.

I also felt this strange physical emptiness in the center of my body... I had never felt anything like it before.

I turned to my friend. He was lying down, but not sleeping as his eyes were open.

"Are you alright?" I asked him.

"Yes, but..."

He sat up and put a hand on his belly.

"I think we should feed ourselves," he finished.

I now understood why I felt so empty. I was hungry. Normally, the Onion provides us with nutrients. But we were alone now.

We needed to find food.

"Wait here," I told him as I walked outside.

I looked around. It was a sunny morning, and there were no obvious signs of danger. Large numbers of colorful flyers danced on the wind far above me, which meant there was nothing around to scare them off.

"The coast is clear," I called back to my friend. He emerged a moment later.

We pushed and shoved our way through a bunch of ferns, searching for a patch of grass. Mercifully, it didn't take us long to find one and we got to plucking. After plucking his third or fourth blade, my friend yielded a pool of nectar. We drank it vigorously and in seconds there wasn't a drop left. Pikmin have tiny little mouths with no teeth, so aside from what the Onion breaks down, our diet is restricted to liquid foods.

Once my friend was done gazing upon his new flower, I asked him the inevitable question.

"So what's the plan?"

He looked at the sky briefly before he answered.

"Let's go to the other end of the forest and wait there."

"Until?"

"Until the Onion eventually lands there. Since it's constantly on the move, I think if we move to a faraway location, we'll have a better chance of running into it."

His plan was based entirely on wishful thinking, but I wasn't in much of a position to argue. So I didn't. He still detected my disapproval, though.

"What've we got to lose?"

I still didn't say anything. It just didn't seem worth arguing over. All my cares in the world had simply faded. I was aware since the previous night that we were most likely never seeing the Onion again, but it was sinking in now.

All that remained was my basic survival instinct, and even that seemed menial, if only for that moment.

He must've figured out he wasn't going to get any words out of me, so he started walking, and I followed him.

* * *

><p>I sat alone in a depression in the ground, waiting. Nothing in particular was on my mind, except for the fact that evening was approaching.<p>

I heard the shoots rustling. Moments later, my friend came down carrying something bigger than he was.

"Here, I found an egg for us to feed on."

I cracked it with a light blow from my flower and fluid slowly oozed out. We ingested it, then discarded the shell.

"How long has it been?" I asked him.

"I don't know. I've lost track."

"Did you find any place for us to nest?"

"No. We'll have to spend the night in this hollow."

"So neither of us know how long it's been since we left, and we have to spend the night in this inadequate shelter... This doesn't give me much hope."

"Well, at the very least, the larger creatures won't be able to reach us down here."

"The smaller creatures will, though."

"Don't worry, they won't think to look here."

Again with his wishful thinking.

"Just in case we don't make it tonight, I just wanted to tell you it's been a nice-"

"Wait, hold on," he interrupted. "I heard something."

I peeked out of the hollow and surveyed my surrounding. The sea of shoots shook and out came...

...A pikmin.

A white pikmin, to be precise.

"What are you doing here?" it asked.

"I was going to ask you that question..."

My friend popped up next to me. He was just as surprised as I was.

"Well, I'm from a colony of strays."

"A colony? Where?" my friend asked.

"Close by. I spied you carrying that egg from far away. Are you strays too?"

"Yes, we were left behind by our Onion. We don't remember how many days it's been, though," I told it.

"I see. You two should come with me."

We obliged to its suggestion and followed it into the shoots.

"Do you go by 'he' or 'she'?" my friend asked.

"She," answered the white pikmin.

"Lucky you missed that Onion. Now you don't have to be soulless anymore. Let's pick up the pace, the others will be happy to meet the two of you."

I was mildly curious as to what she meant by "soulless", mostly because I already considered myself as such, but I didn't feel like questioning her. A disturbed look crossed my friend's face, but he too was silent.

Shortly, we reached a tree stump with a hole in the center.

And that's when everything started to change.


	4. Deserters

The white pikmin led us to a tree stump with a small hole at the base. It reminded me far too much of the crevice we had to stay in the first night.

"Is everything alright?" she asked. "You look upset."

"I am, a little. We had to sleep in a similar place once. It was very uncomfortable."

"You're in for a pleasant surprise, then," she reassured me.

I was. The narrow entrance gave way to a wider, roomier cell, and the floor was matted with soft moss.

There were other pikmin present, of course. They all had flowers and looked at us eagerly.

"Who are they?" asked a blue pikmin.

"I found these two alone in the forest. They were left behind by their Onion days ago. Luckily, they survived long enough for me to stumble upon them."

"Well done, well done. You two are welcome to join us in our cozy little nest here."

"Please, don't mind if I do. We almost had to sleep in a hollow tonight," I said.

"Yeah, this looks like a nice place to settle down. I guess you were all left behind by your Onions too?"

His question was followed by an uncomfortable silence. Brief, but still uncomfortable. Something about his question had thrown them off.

"...Not exactly. But before we talk any further, let's all introduce ourselves. I'm the leader of this group and I go by 'he'," said the blue pikmin.

"I'm second in command and I go by 'he'," said the yellow pikmin. He was unique in that part of his ear was missing.

"I go by 'she'," said a second yellow pikmin.

"You already know about me," said the white pikmin.

"We both go by 'he'," I said.

The concept of gender was embedded in our instinct, because according to the oldest group of pikmin in the Red Onion, the earlier generations reproduced individually. The flowered males would provide what was known as "pollen", and the flowered females would use it to bear seeds. However, this practice ended for reasons that are no longer known. Our self-awareness of our own genders remained, though.

Introductions out of the way, the blue pikmin returned to the previous topic.

"To answer your question, we weren't left behind by our Onions. We left by choice."

My friend produced an expression that reeked of both disbelief and wonderment. I was taken aback by the blue's words, too, but not as much as he was. He tried to say something before the blue continued.

"We've all known each other since before we became strays. Our friendship was possible because all the Onions were traveling together."

I perked up.

"Together? But that only ever happens when..."

"When there are leaders," the blue finished.

I had never actually seen a leader; only heard about them. The most recent leader had left before I was born. Same for my friend.

"There were three leaders. Two of the leaders directed us to collect random objects and do battle with our enemies. Normal leader behavior. But the third, an orange one, treated us differently. It would refuse to give us commands, and instead pushed us to do something... different. We couldn't comprehend it at first, but then we figured out what it wanted. It wanted us to direct ourselves."

My friend and I looked at each other. At this point, the sun had disappeared. The only light in the nest was from the glow of our stems.

"It gave us a vine once and coaxed us to do something with it, but without providing any guidance. After a lot of confusion, we used it to make a game. Each end of the vine would be held by a pikmin, and a third would stand in the middle. While the first two would swing the vine around and around, the third would jump over it. Over time, we got more and more creative with our activities, and the leader was greatly pleased. Thanks to it, we discovered our true potential. After the leaders left, those of us who had followed the orange leader made a pact to leave the Onions and live out here in the forest. There were more of us at the start, but unfortunately, not everyone was able to survive. Some were eaten, others became victims of the elements."

He looked at the others.

"This yellow had part of his ear taken by a Wood Eater, and this white has been the most unfortunate of us."

"Oh, I get it. The white has no Onion, so she was left homeless after the leaders left. I'll bet she's the reason you left your Onions. You didn't want to abandon her," he said.

"Actually, that's not the reason. If we really wanted to, we could've just thrown her into a Changing Flower. That's what purples and whites generally fall back on when they become 'homeless'."

"Then why'd you leave your Onions?"

The blue looked at the male yellow, who nodded at him.

"We left our Onions..." started the blue,

"...Because the life of an Onion-dweller has no meaning."

"What? No, it's the opposite!" my friend protested.

"That's what the other pikmin said when we tried to convince them to leave with us. But it isn't true."

"What leads you to believe this?" I asked him.

"Very well, then. Let me tell you everything that happened after the orange leader left."

My friend and I looked at each other. The uneasiness on his face mirrored my own.


	5. Survival

"The days following our desertion were rough," said the blue. "Originally, there were about thirty of us, give or take. Most died early on, but as time passed, the deaths became less and less frequent. We haven't lost anyone for two seasons, except possibly her..."

"Who's her?" I asked.

"There's a fifth pikmin, but there hasn't been any sign of her for two days. She was standing at the edge of a cliff when the dirt crumbled and sent her toppling down the slope. We couldn't see if she survived because there were too many trees in the way, and the slope was too steep to be climbed. She might turn up eventually, but I'm not very optimistic."

"Unlike a certain someone I know," I said, indicating at the other red. He narrowed his eyes at me.

"At first, we had trouble protecting ourselves from the creatures of the night. The little scrapes and crevices we came across couldn't shelter us all, and a night wouldn't pass where at least two of us wouldn't get devoured. At one point, a Spotted Demon died after eating some whites, and we were so desperate that we resorted to hiding inside of its mouth for the remainder of the night, hoping that our enemies wouldn't think to look inside."

I cringed at the thought of spending an whole night in the mouth of a Demon, even if it was dead.

"Things changed for the better on the seventh day. Only nine of us remained, and we had lost almost all hope. But then we reflected upon our experience with the Orange Leader. It encouraged us to be 'creative' with our activities, so we decided to try and apply that to our survival dilemma. If we couldn't find a good place to nest, we'd simply make one ourselves."

"You _made _a place to nest?" I asked him. I'd never heard of pikmin building anything other than a bridge, let alone their own place to stay at night. My friend stared at the blue intently.

"We gathered a bunch of twigs and fashioned them into a sphere, a hollow sphere with a hole for an entrance. It was just big enough for all of us to fit inside, and we put it in a spot where we figured it wouldn't stand out too much. To our surprise, it actually worked for awhile. We heard the loud footsteps of nearby predators, but none of them suspected our makeshift hideout. Unfortunately, we ran out of luck the very next morning when a bunch of Wood Eaters appeared and devoured our nest while we were still in it. We barely managed to escape, and we were certainly lucky they showed up in the morning and not the middle of the night."

"When he says barely, he means barely. One of those Wood Eaters was the very one that tore off half my ear," said the male yellow.

"Indeed, it's very fortunate we all made it out alive. The following night, we sought safety in a tree, but unfortunately, it was infested with smaller, yellowish Demons. They had no legs or spots, but they were still every bit as voracious as their larger brethren, crawling across the wood in pursuit of us. We made another narrow escape by leaping to the branch of another tree, but not before the last red was surrounded and devoured. Now we were down to eight.

"We were safe in the other tree for a little while, but then we came under attack by these multi-legged creatures that were making their way up the trunk. We saw no other option than to stand and fight, but surely there was no way we could fend them all off with our stems alone. It was then that our last remaining purple got an idea. If he was strong enough to lift a Spotted Demon's body by himself, perhaps he could use his strength to fight. As the worms approached, he grabbed them and flung them off the tree one by one."

Our stems stiffened at this. I could hardly believe what I was hearing.

"We lasted the night with no further casualties, at the expense of the purple not getting any sleep. Once we made our way back to the ground, we dug ourselves a little space under a big rock and nested there. This proved to be surprisingly effective as no creature disturbed us that night, not even those that can dig. We rested easy for a whole season, and during that time, we taught ourselves tricks and maneuvers to compensate for our low numbers. We did still have the occasional daytime predator to worry about, after all.

"This period of ease didn't last, however, as the Season of Snow soon set in. The rock did little to keep us warm, and food became scarce. We were constantly hungry and suffering from the cold."

His statement worried me a bit, as we were in the Season of Leaves, which is followed by the Season of Snow.

"We were forced to move on in search of warmth. Along the way, we were caught in a blizzard. It was so fierce that we accidentally separated from the purple, along with two blues. Searching for them in such poor conditions would've been pointless, so we continued marching and discovered the stump that we're sitting inside as I speak. At first, the crevice was small and barely shielded us from the freezing winds, but through our combined efforts, we were able to hollow it out enough to accommodate us better. We also started stockpiling our food so we wouldn't have to brave the cold as often. After countless days, the Season of Snow finally ended and the Season of Flowers set in. Life has been good ever since."

"Did you ever find the three pikmin you lost in the blizzard?" I asked.

"Well... Yes, but by the time we did, they had already frozen to death."

"Oh..." I muttered.

"What does that have anything to do with the Onions?" my friend asked.

"The point is we don't need the Onions to survive," the blue replied.

"But most of you were slaughtered!"

"That's because it took us awhile to figure it out. Besides, we would have never come up with such great ideas had we not left."

"Great ideas? You would've never needed those ideas to begin with had you stayed with your Onion!"

"It's not just about survival! It's about potential! We could be-"

The white put a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

"Calm yourself, Leader Blue. We'll show him in the morning."

He nodded.

"Let's all get some rest."

We dimmed the glow in our stems and settled down to sleep. I was somewhat looking forward to whatever it was they had to show us, but my friend clearly wasn't, because despite the darkness, I could still make out the intense look on his face...


	6. Demon Horde

**I've finished my first year of college, which means I have time to update this again!**

"Wake up," I heard a faint voice say. I payed it little heed, though.

"Wake up!" it said louder. I jolted awake, my eyes struggling to focus on the blue pikmin before me.

"Blugh… What time of the day is it?" I asked him groggily.

"Daybreak," he replied.

"What?!" I exclaimed as I scrambled to my feet. "Where's the danger? What's happening?"

"…There is no danger…"

I tilted my head at him, confused.

"Then why'd you wake me up so early?"

"Because this is the best time to forage. The creatures that come at night are going to sleep, while those that hunt by day have yet to awaken."

I was genuinely baffled. Throughout my whole life, I had never met a pikmin that didn't willingly sleep through most of the morning. That's why I assumed we were been under attack or something.

"Is this a regular thing for you all?" I asked.

"Absolutely," he answered. I could tell he was somewhat amused.

I looked around. Everyone else was awake, too. My red pikmin friend looked rather frazzled.

"You didn't sleep that well, did you?"

He didn't answer, preferring to let his leer do the talking.

"Let's move out," said the blue.

We did just that. The two yellows flanked the blue, my red friend butt in the rear, and the white and I stayed in the middle. She stole a glance at my friend before turning to me.

"Is he alright?" she whispered.

"He's fine. He just doesn't like this whole we-don't-need-the-Onion stuff."

"Oh… Well, I'm sure he'll get over it," she said.

"Say, what color were you when you were born? The elders at my Onion say that all purples and whites were once different pikmin."

"I don't know…" she muttered.

"What do you mean?"

"I have no memory of what happened before I was plucked by the orange leader. I've heard other whites speak of how they used to be red, blue or yellow, but I can't remember anything prior to the point that I was plucked. I'm pretty sure that's not normal…" Her stem drooped slightly.

"It… isn't," I said sheepishly, trying not to sound rude. "But maybe someday you'll get your memory back?"

"Maybe. But it's a non-issue to me," she quickly replied, obviously wanting to drop the subject.

The next few minutes were quiet. After crossing a branch over a pit, we came across some small, fallen berries… along with a bunch of sleeping demons. To reach our prize, we would have to navigate around them.

"Ready?" asked the blue.

We all nodded.

As usual, the blue took the lead. We followed him, treading lightly between the snoring beasts. There must've been around twelve of them, but I wasn't phased as I had dealt with situations like this before. The others didn't seem to be nervous either. There were two or three instances where we paused because we thought one of the demons might be waking up, but they all turned out to be false alarms. I had always been glad that demons didn't wake easily, unless they were orange demons...

A lot of colorful flyers were perching upon the backs of the demons. I had seen them do this plenty of times before, but I never understood _why_ they did it. Did they not fear getting eaten…?

Soon enough, we reached the berries. Each one of us picked up one of the small fruits and made our way back in the direction from where we came. We were about halfway through the demons' sleeping area when all of the flyers suddenly took flight.

"Well, that can't possibly be good…" said the male yellow.

"What's that noise?" I asked. I heard a sound that was similar to the one made by the creature that snatched me all those days ago, only louder. Everyone's stems stiffened in alarm, except for my friend's and my own.

"Everybody get down, and use your berries as cover," the blue commanded quietly, but forcefully. We did just that, trying to hide underneath the berries that were barely wider than us. I was facing skyward, so I could see the creature that was approaching. It was airborne, and very strange looking in that it had a shell covering its front half, but not its rear half. It was like the backwards version of a red-eyed stabber…

"Ever seen a red-eyed stabber?" the white whispered to me. I would've been amused by her timing if the creature hadn't been hovering nearby.

"Yeah."

"This beast is similar, only it flies."

"Does it launch its mouth too?" I asked.

"Unfortunately," she answered.

"Hush. It might hear us," whispered the female yellow.

The "blue-eyed stabber" slowly hovered over our location. I started to feel incredibly nervous when it paused directly above me, but after a few seconds, it passed.

"I think it's safe to proceed now," said the blue as he pushed his berry aside and stood up. The rest of us followed suit.

"Let's hurry before anything else happe-… OH, NO…"

The blue's eyes shrunk. I turned around and saw why.

There was a lone colorful flyer, standing vulnerably on a demon, and the blue-eyed stabber was staring directly at it.

Poised to attack.

"NO!" I heard myself shout as the stabber flung its pointy mouth. The flyer fled at the last second and the appendage missed its mark…

…instead embedding itself into the demon's back.

The beast shrieked in pain and jumped to its feet. The stabber wrenched itself free, ascending lazily as the demon's brethren stirred, alerted by the first one's cry. They moaned lustfully as their eyes locked on us.

"You know what to do!" the blue said to the white as he motioned us to follow him.

"Right!" she said as she sprinted away in the other direction.

"What are you doing?!" I called after her.

"Distracting them!" she called back.

"What?!" my red friend and I exclaimed in unison.

"She knows what she's doing!" said the male yellow.

"Wouldn't be the first time she's pulled this off, and I doubt it'll be the last. Now let's move!" demanded the blue. Reluctantly, we followed them back in the direction of the nest as the demons shifted their attention to the white.

At first I simply ran, but after a short period of time, I started to feel the same way I felt when my friend almost got eaten by crawlers. There was no way I was leaving her behind.

I came to a complete stop and looked back. The white was using her speed to skillfully avoid the snapping jaws of the demons, who clumsily crashed into the ground after her, obviously groggy from their rude awakening.

"Come on!" I heard the blue say. He noticed that I had stopped following him more quickly than I anticipated he would.

"Go on! I'll catch up!" I replied without looking back.

He must've realized that he couldn't change my mind, because all I heard after that was a loud sigh and a bunch of footsteps traveling in the other direction.

…In addition to another set of footsteps approaching in my direction. I still didn't look back. I knew it was my red friend.

The white continued to evade the demons, who tried to snap her up with increasing ferocity.

"We have to help her," I said to him before running in her direction. He said nothing and only followed. In a matter of seconds, I was upon the frantic scene.

"Wait, hold on! We need to think of a plan fir-…"

My friend's voice grew distant as he fell behind. I didn't care. Without even realizing what I was doing, I tackled the leg of a demon that was closing in on the white. It grunted and tried to stomp on me, but I dodged it.

"What do you think you're doing?!" she stammered.

"Helping!"

"You don't have the speed! You're going to die!"

I grabbed onto the demon's leg as the others homed in on me.

"If it means saving one of my fellow pikmin, then I wouldn't have it any other way!"

The white stuttered in surprise. I sprang from the demon's leg as a second one lunged at me, causing it to topple its partner. As the two of them collapsed in a heap, three more bared down on me. Everything was happening so quickly that I barely had time to think.

"Fine, you want to help? Throw me at that one's eye!" she commanded.

"How will that-"

"Just do it!" she said curtly.

I didn't have time to argue as it was literally do-or-die time, so I gripped her stem and chucked her at the closest demon. She ricocheted off its eye, causing it to cry out in pain and shake its head furiously, bumping into the adjacent demons and throwing them off slightly.

_"So this is what she meant by thinking creatively..." _I thought as the white scurried back to me.

"Now's our chance!" she said, pulling at my arm. We started running, only to be intercepted yet again.

"Provoke it into attacking you. I'll handle the rest," she said.

I was massively confused by this, but followed her order anyway. I stood before the demon and waved my stem at it until it dove for me. I jumped backwards and it hit the dirt. Before I even landed, the white sped up to the monster and stuck her hand into its nostril. It immediately roared in displeasure, exhaling forcefully through its nose as it shakily got to its feet.

"Let's go!" she said. We went as fast as our feet could carry us as the sounds of angry demons filled the forest. It wasn't until we crossed the pit again that we stopped.

"What did you do to that demon?" I asked, genuinely curious.

"You're aware that white pikmin contain poison, correct?"

"Yeah."

"I've seen plenty of my kind get devoured throughout my life, and each time, I saw that they would only bleed poison when crushed in the creature's mouth. Based on this, I figured out that the key was pressure. While you were distracting the demon, I squeezed my arm until some poison oozed onto my hand, then I stuck it into the demon's nose," she explained, rubbing the sore spot on her arm.

"Interesting..." I remarked, thinking again about the creativity they discussed.

There was a brief pause.

"Did you mean what you said back there? Would you really die for me?" she asked.

"Yeah, he probably would," said my friend as he caught up with us. He sounded chipper for the first time in awhile. "He's tried to throw his life away for _me_ enough times, anyway. What you just did was completely and utterly insane, by the way."

"Says the pikmin who gave up the Onion just to stay with me," I joked.

"Giving up the Onion wasn't insane of him. He made the right choice," she said. My friend's face contorted slightly, but he didn't break his demeanor.

"Anyway, thank you for the help, even though I didn't need it," she finished, embracing me with a hug.

"Don't mention it," I said, patting her on the back. "The leader will be upset with me though, won't he?"

"Yeah, he will," she said.


	7. Argument

When we returned to the nest, we were greeted by the female yellow.

"Thank goodness you're both alright," she said, wrapping her arms around me and my red friend.

"You can thank the white for that," I replied. "Though I don't think my friend here was ever really in danger…"

"I wasn't," said my friend.

"And neither was the white," said a stern voice.

I looked over the female yellow and saw the blue. I could tell by his expression that he wasn't pleased. The male yellow was standing next to him and shaking his head, like he knew this wasn't going to be pleasant.

"She was surrounded by hungry demons. You really think she wasn't in danger?" I stated flatly.

"She's done this countless times before."

"It's true. I have," she said. She sounded apologetic, likely because she wasn't supporting me.

"I don't care. You were under attack by predators, so I lent you a hand. How is that a bad thing?"

"It's a bad thing because you could've died," said the blue.

"She could've died too," I retorted.

"She's been living out here for seasons! You, on the other hand, haven't even been with us for a whole day!"

"So what? My friend and I managed to survive long enough for you to find us, didn't we?

"Stop! Please!" the white pikmin pleaded. There was a pause before she continued.

"Listen... I appreciate you trying to help, but the leader is right. I didn't need it."

I glared at her questioningly.

"So what are you saying? That you expect me to leave you behind every time something like that happens? What if I got ambushed by a bunch of demons or hoppers or something? Would you just stand back and let me take my chances?"

"No, that's not what I-"

"What she's trying to say is that your tenacity is going to be the death of you," said the blue.

"And just what's wrong with his tenacity?" my friend interjected with a surprising amount of force.

"Isn't it obvious?" asked the blue.

"No, it isn't! In fact, if it wasn't for his 'tenacity', I'd be a pile of crawler crap right now!"

I was confused by his statement at first, but then I remembered how I had saved him from a bunch of crawlers the night we were left behind.

"That's not-"

"You know what I think? I think being away from your Onion has made you lose sight of your community values!"

His accusation was followed by a dead silence. The blue stared at him in disbelief.

"…You think I don't have community values?"

My friend nodded at him.

"And you think it's because I left my Onion?"

He nodded again.

The blue placed a hand on his temple and shook his head. He didn't seem angry, but exasperated.

"We can debate about my sense of community later. Right now, I think the other misconception is more important," he said.

"The Onion part?" my friend asked.

"Yes, that," he said as he walked up to the exit.

"Come with me. I'm going to show you exactly what kind of 'communities' the Onions harbor."

The male yellow took a few steps forward, giving the blue a look of disapproval.

"Don't do this," he said.

"No. He needs to learn," said the blue.

The male yellow sighed.

"You're welcome to come along too, if you're still in doubt," the blue said to me.

I nodded before following him and my friend out of the nest. As I left, I glanced back at the other pikmin. The male yellow looked at me worriedly, the female yellow was visibly frightened and the white muttered "good luck" in an unsettled tone.

We walked in silence. Along the way, I wondered what it was exactly that the blue was talking about. We both knew what it was like to live in an Onion, so what could he show me and my friend that we didn't already know? How would he even go about showing us?

We traveled a considerable distance before he finally spoke.

"We're almost there," he said, pointing at the ground. I looked to where he was pointing and saw something that confused me even further.

It was the corpse of an orange pikmin.


	8. Orange and Black

My friend and I stared at the dead orange pikmin in fascination. Neither of us had ever seen one before. Physically, it was similar to red, yellow and blue pikmin, but covering the upper-half of its head was something that resembled half a nutshell. Its color could only be described as some sort of midway point between orange and brown, and it had a hole in it that was just wide enough for the stem to fit through. The pikmin itself also had two ashy, parallel streaks on either of its cheeks.

"Where did it find that thing on its head?" I asked.

"It didn't," answered the Leader Blue. "They're born that way."

I found that hard to believe at first, but then again, the shell was a perfect fit for its head. Too perfect to have been crafted.

"Is this what you wanted to show us?" my friend asked.

"Sort of," said the blue. "Come on. Let's keep walking."

As we moved on, I looked back at the body one last time. That's when something occurred to me. What had killed the pikmin? Most of our predators simply devour us, and those that don't always leave a mutilated corpse.

Yet the orange pikmin was still intact.

"Do you know how it died?" I asked.

The blue didn't answer my question. Instead, he shot me an exasperated and almost apologetic glare, like he knew I wouldn't like the answer.

And as I would find out soon enough, he was right.

It wasn't long after he broke his gaze that we were approached by four orange pikmin. Seeing them alive excited me, but at the same time, made me feel nervous...

"Oh, hello, blue," said one of the oranges, obviously recognizing him. "What brings you to our part of the forest?"

For some reason, it was speaking in a condescending tone.

"I'm just taking my friends sight-seeing", he answered. My friend and I exchanged sarcastic glances.

"Oh, is that so?" it said. "They're not working for an Onion, are they?"

"No, they were left behind."

"Good."

"What do you mean 'good'?" my red friend interjected. The blue motioned for him to be quiet, but it was too late.

"What I mean is that we don't need any more competition. We've got enough of that, already."

"Competition?" he asked.

"Did I stutter?" the orange responded.

I tried to lighten to conversation with a question.

"Do you go by 'he' or 'she'?" I asked.

"None of your damn business," it responded curtly.

I scowled, not liking its attitude.

"What's wrong? Did I make you mad?" it mocked. The other three oranges laughed.

"If you're feeling so tough, then why don't you come over here and show us what you're made of?" it mocked again.

Its words infuriated me, and I came this close to accepting its challenge. Call me cocky, but as a red pikmin, I was pretty sure I could take all four of them by myself.

I didn't get the chance, however

Before I knew what was happening, I heard a battle cry as a group of pikmin charged from some nearby cover and rushed the oranges. There must've been at least a dozen of them, and in a flurry of swinging stems, they battered away at the struggling oranges. But what really caught my eye was their dark coloration, darker than that of any other pikmin I had ever seen. They were another new pikmin.

They were black.

Soon enough, all the oranges were dead. The blacks had suffered no casualties, though one of them appeared to be badly injured. As most of the others came to its attention, one of them pranced up to the blue.

"Thanks for distracting them, buddy! You are that same blue from all those days ago, aren't you?"

"Yeah, that would be me."

"Aye, aye. I see you've got two new recruits for your gang of sad-sacks!"

"We're not sad-sacks…"

"Don't be offended. It's better to be sad-sacks than to be in our way. Otherwise, you'd just end up like them," he said, pointing at the oranges.

"Uh-huh…"

"Well, have fun with your sight seeing," it said. "Oh, and by the way…"

It turned to me.

"That orange was a 'she'."

It then joined its comrades in assessing the injured pikmin. While we were watching, I took the time to examine the black pikmin's features. They were short, like white pikmin, but slightly thicker, and had dark-cyan spots on their cheeks. There was something very peculiar about those spots...

"What are their powers?" I asked the blue.

"I don't know. They won't tell me."

I was perplexed by this. Why wouldn't they want to tell him? Why were these pikmin so strange? What was the point of the ambush I just saw, and why did they spare us just because we lost our Onions.? I just didn't understand...

My thoughts were interrupted by loud screeches in the distance. Screeches that were distinctly pikmin-like…

"Whoops, duty calls!" said the black pikmin, running off with its kin (except for the injured one, who hid underneath some clovers).

"Up there," said the blue, pointing to a hill that ended in a cliff. My friend and I looked at each other. Neither one of us wanted to know what was at the top of that hill, but we begrudgingly followed him anyway.

Once we reached our destination, we saw that the cliff overlooked a valley.

A valley that was full of fighting pikmin.

As far as the eye could see, orange and black pikmin were trying to kill each other in every way possible. Some were exchanging blows with their stems, others were wrestling on the ground, and still others were being blown to pieces by random bomb-rock explosions. Pellets and fallen beasts floated back and forth as the pikmin fought for them.

"What is the meaning of all this? Why are they fighting?" I asked him, my voice shaking.

"Simple. They don't like sharing."

Just when I thought things couldn't get any more nightmarish, I heard the sound of huge stomps. A freakishly tall beast had entered the clearing, lifting one spindly leg at a time as it blissfully dragged its feet across the battlefield. It was a Towering Orbwalker, a creature that no pikmin wanted to be caught underneath.

And yet neither the blacks nor the oranges reacted to its presence.

Even as it crushed them with every step.

"Why aren't they…?" I began.

"Why aren't they trying to avoid it? Because they're so hell-bent on fighting, and the risk of getting crushed isn't enough to deter them.

"What does this have anything to do with the Onions?" my friend asked. His voice was shaky, too.

"Their Onions are the reason they're fighting in the first place. The Orange and Black Onions land in the same location every day, and these pikmin think their sole purpose in life is to provide for them as much as possible, so they fight over resources. So much for those community values you mentioned."

"How could you blame this on their Onions?! Our colors have Onions too, but we don't fight like this!"

"It's only that way because our colors were found by Leaders. They taught us the importance of cooperation and teamwork. However, these pikmin were never found by any Leader. I hate to break this to you, but this is the default behavior of a pikmin."

My friend was enraged. And so was I, a little.

"No… No, there's no way you can honestly believe that!" my friend snapped.

The blue said nothing, but it was obvious by his deadpan expression that he really did believe it.

"You listen, and you listen good," my friend started. "No matter what you say, I will NEVER turn my back on my Onion."

"I don't see what good that'll do, considering your Onion has already turned its back on you…"

"WHAT?!"

Reflexively, I jumped in front of my friend, restraining him as he lashed out at the blue.

"Get a hold of yourself!" I pleaded, even though I was pretty angry at the blue myself.

"See? This is the violent, Onion-driven behavior I was talking about," said the blue.

My friend stopped struggling. He must've realized that he had just given the blue a symbolic victory.

"My Onion didn't turn its back on anyone. It was either us or every other pikmin in the colony. That's how nightfall works," he growled.

"Look, are we finished 'sight-seeing' yet? We still haven't eaten, and its midday," I complained, partly because I was sick of them arguing, and partly because I wanted to leave this place and never come back.

"Very well," said the blue.

The blue went back in the direction of the nest, and we followed him, both of us wishing we had never come out here in the first place...


	9. Spice Grove

The journey back to the nest was a quiet one. My friend and I didn't so much as even glance at each other, and the blue never once looked back at us. Along the way, we came across some Demon Harbingers sniffing at the ground, but thankfully, they didn't catch our scent and we were able to sneak past them.

The second we entered the stump, the white and the female yellow gave us a disturbed stare. Our expressions must've been rather telling...

"Well, I'd say that went just about as horribly as I expected," said the male yellow, scowling.

"I showed them what they needed to see," the blue retorted. The yellow shook his head, still not agreeing with him.

"We found some food while you were gone," said the white, giving each of us each a handful of little spheres. "They're Wood Eater eggs."

I had never tasted the eggs of Crawlers, or Wood Eaters, as they liked to call them. I cracked one in my hand and drank the liquid. It wasn't that great.

"Can I talk to you two for a minute?" asked the male yellow. We nodded. On the way out, I caught a glimpse of the yellow and the blue exchanging glares.

"Listen... I don't know what that pikmin was thinking, but he had no business taking you to the oranges and the blacks. I wish I had done more to stop him."

"So do we."

I said that as though I was joking, even though I wasn't.

"Do you really think its the Onions' fault they're doing that?" my friend asked.

"I don't know, and personally, I don't care. That's why I have something else in mind."

"Something else?" I asked.

"Yes. I'm going to take you on a field trip of my own."

We both scowled at him.

"It won't be anything horrifying this time!" he quickly uttered, accurately predicting what I was about to say.

"Blue! I'm taking them to the Spice Grove!" he hollered.

"Very well, then," the blue replied, though we barely heard him.

Instantaneously, the female yellow and the white emerged from the nest.

"We're coming too," said the female yellow.

I was happy they were joining us. The blue remained in the stump, but I can't say I minded much.

* * *

><p>We walked through the forest for some time, but it didn't feel as long as the previous trip. Miraculously, we didn't encounter any threats aside from the occasional Demon Harbinger. They never spotted us, but I found it worrying that some of them were orange...<p>

"White, you said you don't know what color you used to be, right?" I asked.

She nodded.

"Well, why didn't you just ask the other pikmin that were around?"

"They didn't know either. In fact, they told me I was growing all alone until the Orange Leader found me. I didn't even know that purples and whites used to be other pikmin until I met up with the other whites in the group."

"Interesting..."

That was all I had to say about the matter. Once again, we were silent for awhile, at least until we entered a hollow...

"Stop," said the white.

"What is it?" asked my red friend.

"Up ahead. There's a Dirt Dragon waiting to ambush us."

I was about to question her, but then I remembered that white pikmin can somehow spot things that are underground.

Our challenge now was to find a way around the beast.

I picked up a small rock and chucked it as far as I could. It skid across the ground and, surely enough, the Dirt Dragon emerged and pointed its odd-looking mouth at the spot where the rock landed.

I couldn't help but admire the shininess of its blue body, but unfortunately, its speedy reaction time meant it wouldn't be easy to sneak past this thing.

"Everybody lay low. I have an idea," said the white.

"And _don't _interfere this time," she added, referring specifically to me. I knew instantly that whatever she was going to do would be dangerous.

We huddled against the side of the path as she scampered off. In a relatively short period of time, she came back with a Demon Harbinger in pursuit. My stomach lurched as it passed us.

The Harbinger had difficulty keeping up with her, so she had to stop occasionally so it wouldn't lose interest.

It didn't take me long to figure out what she was trying to do.

I moved into the center of the path to get a better look just as the Dirt Dragon erupted once again. The white curled into a tight ball and rolled out of the way as the Dragon launched its yellow weapon. The Harbinger didn't have time to flee as it was grasped and swallowed.

Or at least, the Dragon was _trying _to swallow it. It seemed to be having some trouble...

"Now!" shouted the white.

We ran as fast as we could past the Dragon as it struggled with its meal. Once we were at a safe distance, I looked back one more time and saw the lump moving down its body...

"So... what are we going to do on the way back?" I asked.

"The pikmin I'm going to introduce you to should be able to help us with that," said the male yellow.

"Pikmin?" my friend and I asked in unison.

"See for yourself," he said as we exited the hollow. In front of us was a plant bearing spicy berries, and gathered around them were pikmin. They appeared to be orange at first, but upon closer inspection, their hands and feet were green, as was their stems.

But the most striking feature was that each one had two conjoined leaves that resembled a mouth...

"Say hello to the Trapmin," said the male yellow.

**Sorry that this update is so short, but a lot is about to happen with the Trapmin, so I think it's best that I cut it here and save all the action for next chapter. The Trapmin themselves were created by V Rex for my use.**


	10. Trapmin

We stared perplexedly at the "trapmin" before us. Never before had I seen a pikmin that didn't have a leaf, bud, or flower. The... thing on the trapmin's stem could've been seen as two "leaves", but even that felt like a stretch. If anything, it resembled the mouth of a Flower Imposter.

"Welcome back, everyone," said one of the trapmin. "I see you've brought some new faces."

"Indeed," said the male yellow. "This is their second day with us."

"Speaking of faces, where's the blue pikmin's? I don't suppose he's been...?"

"Oh, don't worry. He's alive and well. He just needs to be alone right now."

I gave the yellow a questioning look. He must've known what I was thinking, because he responded by asking,

"Why don't you two ask the trapmin about themselves?"

My friend and I glanced at each other.

"Well..."

I felt something lightly tugging my arm. It was the white pikmin.

"Don't worry. They don't bite," she said softly.

"If they're going to ask about us, what do you say we ask about them too? We've never seen red pikmin before," said the trapmin. The three others behind it nodded in agreement.

"Fair enough," I said.

"First off, what are those pikmin..."

I paused because it felt really weird calling them "pikmin".

"...doing back there?"

Several of the trapmin were clinging to a Spice Plant, striking away at the berries. As far as I knew, spicy berries were useless without a Leader around.

"Ah! They're collecting berries for defensive purposes," it answered.

"Defensive purposes?"

"Do you go by he or she?" my friend asked, cutting me off before I could pursue the matter further.

"...Neither," it said.

"What?" we both said.

"We've been over this already with your friends. Whatever 'sense' you might have, we lack. None of us are he, none of us are she, we just... are."

My friend and I were speechless.

"I wish you two could see your faces right now," it said, laughing. "It's alright. I reacted the same way when I first heard of these "Onions" your friends used to ha-"

"Heard?! What do you mean "heard"?! Do you not have an Onion of your own?!" my friend replied in an outburst. The male yellow motioned for him to lower his voice.

"We don't."

"Then what do you sleep in at night?" I asked, more curious than ever now.

"In hiding places? You and your friends don't sleep in an Onion either, if I'm not mistaken."

"Well, yeah, but what I meant was..."

"Red," said the male yellow. "They don't have anything resembling an Onion."

I turned my attention back to the trapmin and re-examined it from head to toe. The weird mouth-like plant, the orange and green coloration, the lack of an Onion... I couldn't even call it "he" or "she".

_What was I looking at? Was it even a pikmin?_

"Look!" said the white, pointing at the trapmin who were harvesting berries. They were now on the ground with their fruit, bashing it to pieces. Once they had finished, each trapmin scooped up a piece of berry between its "leaves" and snapped them shut.

My expression must've been hilarious.

"...Um...?" is all I could bring myself to say.

"They're using their traps to break down the berry bits," said the trapmin.

"I can see that, but why are they putting them inside their... "traps"?" I asked, the trapmin's name suddenly making sense to me.

"That's what I was referring to! They're using their traps to break down the berries, so they can use them to-"

"WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!" somebody screamed. A trapmin came sprinting from the distance.

"Perfect timing," said the male yellow, much to my confusion.

"WE'RE UNDER ATTACK! WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!" it kept repeating. Various trapmin emerged and gathered around the one I had been speaking with. I could only watch as they confabulated amongst themselves.

"None of you seem phased by this..." said my friend, referring to the yellows and the white.

I hadn't even noticed. Despite the fact that we were "under attack", they were all very calm.

"Pay close attention. This is going to be quite the sight," said the female yellow.

A large figure was approaching from the distance. Soon enough, it was clear that it was an Orange Demon, confirming my suspicion about the Orange Harbingers from before. The trapmin must have disturbed it from its slumber, which isn't very hard to do...

Instead of running, most of the trapmin formed a blockade, while the remainder stood further back. The frontliners opened their traps and released a red mist, causing them to glow brightly.

"Is that...?" my friend asked.

"Spicy mist?" I finished.

I was certain that only Leaders could spray mist, but these trapmin had pulled if off themselves. Those who had been affected by the mist scurried frantically around the Orange Demon, greatly confusing it. Its eyes darted here and there, trying unsuccessfully to track the movements of the frenzied lights. Every time it attempted to strike, it was met with the dusty ground.

The Demon was so distracted by the display that that didn't see the non-glowing trapmin closing in. Together, they sprayed a gray mist at its legs, coating them in a crusty material. The Demon immediately came thundering to the ground, frantically wiggling its limbs.

"Bitter mist..." I mumbled.

Two additional trapmin sprinted forward and leveled their mouths at the Demon's nose, blasting each nostril with a green mist. The beast roared loudly and sprang to its feet, breaking out of the bitter crust, and fled back in the direction in came. The trapmin cheered.

"What was that last mist?" I asked.

"Sour mist. Everything hates the way it smells, including us. Only the trapmin can stand it."

I didn't know how to respond, and neither did my friend. The trapmin I was speaking to returned.

"So anyway, what are your powers?" it asked. It was like it had already forgotten what just happened.

"Fire doesn't kill us, and we're better at fighting than other pikmin... except maybe purples."

"There are purple pikmin too?" It sounded very curious.

"Yes. They're the biggest pikmin of all," said my friend.

It didn't ask any more questions, and we fell silent again.

"Have you two seen enough?" asked the male yellow.

"Yeah, I think so," I said. My friend didn't reply.

The male yellow bid the trapmin farewell, and we proceeded on our way back home. However, I couldn't help but feel confused.

"So what was the point of all that?" I asked the yellow.

"The point is that they don't have an Onion, but survive just fine regardless. Serving an Onion isn't part of being a pikmin."

"But then again, there aren't too many pikmin that shoot mist..." said my friend, raising a good point.

"Yes, but there also aren't too many pikmin who are shock-proof and go higher when thrown. We're all different."

"You know, I just wondered. How do the trapmin multiply, exactly?" asked the white.

"...I have no idea. I've been meaning to ask them that myself," said the male yellow.

"Hey, hold on," said my friend. "If the trapmin are so talented, then why don't we live with them? Doesn't that sound safer?"

"Sure it does. I mean, we could just laze around all day in trapmin turf, assuring ourselves that they'll protect us from predators. But what if something were to happen to the trapmin? By then, we would've already forgotten how to take care of ourselves, and then it's over. Better to learn how to rely on yourself than to rely on others."

"I'm guessing that's how you feel about the Onion?"

"Precisely."

I gazed at him as we continued to walk. He was much less vehement than the blue, but I still found it hard to agree with him.

My concentration was broken when my friend whispered something to me.

"I don't know what those trapmin are exactly, but they're definitely not pikmin. Agreed?"

"Agreed..." I muttered.

**Once again, the trapmin were conceived by V Rex.**


	11. The Floating Prison

As we continued on our way, the white pikmin asked me a question.

"Red? Are you okay? You've been seeming out of sorts ever since we saw the trapmin."

She had said that just loud enough for me to hear.

"They just... weird me out. It's one thing to not have a leaf, bud or flower, but they don't even have an Onion..."

"Neither do whites and purples..."

"Yes, but all whites and purples were once reds, yellows or blues, all of which have Onions. It all goes back to an Onion."

She didn't pursue the matter further. Nobody spoke again until we returned to the spot where the Dirt Dragon lurked.

"Here we are again..." said the male yellow.

"Didn't you say the trapmin were going to help us with this?" asked the female yellow.

"I did... and I completely forgot to bring it up. Looks like we'll have to go back..."

"Let's not!" I uttered without thinking.

"Yeah, I'm sure we can come up with something on our own. It'll be an exercise of this creativity thing you speak of," said my friend. Clearly he was thinking the same thing I was.

"...Very well..." said the male yellow with a hint of suspicion in his voice. The white pikmin shook her head.

"I don't suppose you two have any ideas, then?" asked the female yellow.

"I do, actually," said my friend.

"...You do?" I asked.

"White, where's the Dirt Dragon right now?" he inquired.

"Near the left side of the hollow, but how does that-"

"It's simple, then. We just run down the side farthest from the Dragon, and it won't be able to reach us in time!"

We all stared at him.

"That seems a little too easy to actually work," said the male yellow.

"I'll prove it. Watch."

My friend picked up a stone and threw it at the side where the Dragon was located. The instant it hit the ground, the beast erupted from the earth. It scanned its surroundings for a bit before diving back into its burrow.

He picked up another stone and threw it to the opposite side. It hit the ground and sat idly for a few moments before the Dragon reemerged.

"See? It took longer that time."

"Yes, but I doubt that's long enough..." said the male yellow.

"I've got that covered too," he said.

I scratched my head. What was that pikmin plotting?

* * *

><p>"Ready, everyone?" my friend asked, holding another stone.<p>

"Ready as I'll ever be," I said.

"Are you absolutely sure this is a good idea?" asked the male yellow.

"Of course I am! White, is the Dragon still on the right side?"

"Yes," she affirmed.

"Alright! Let's do this!"

He chucked his stone at the right side and we immediately sprinted down the left side. When the stone landed, the Dragon reared up, then spun around to look at us. It must've been surprised to see that we were out of range. When it dove back down, I ran twice as fast. The ground shook a little as the Dragon reappeared, but it felt too far away to be a threat. Before I knew it, we were out of the hollow.

"See? What did I tell you? No way that thing had enough time to pop up, go back down and pop up again to catch us!" my friend bragged.

"That... was well-played," the male yellow admitted.

"You'll make a fine group-member!" said the female yellow.

My friend's face went blank. Apparently, he wasn't sure whether he should take that as a compliment.

Once his moment of glory died down, we continued on our way until we arrived at the nest.

"So how'd _you _do?" the blue asked the male yellow, unenthused.

"...We'll see," he replied, narrowing his eyes. "However, you may be pleased to hear that our dear red friend just showed an excellent display of creativi-"

"Let's not talk about that!" my friend suddenly interjected.

"Erm... okay. Never mind, then..." he said, giving my friend a funny look.

The blue eyed them suspiciously. I was confused, too. Why wouldn't he want the blue to know about that?

"Apparently, we made it back just in time. It's getting late," said the white, trying to change the subject.

She was right. I peaked out the nest's entrance and saw that the sky was orange. I didn't even realize how dark it was getting.

"So tell me," said my friend. "Do you know of any other pikmin types? Aside from us, purples, oranges and blacks?"

"And trapmin. Don't forget them," the white chimed in.

"Uh... yeah. Them too," he muttered with thinly veiled insincerity.

"Have you ever heard of the Chimeras?" asked the blue.

"Of course I have. Isn't that common knowledge?" asked my friend.

"I suppose, but they're usually only found in caves, so I thought I'd mention them anyway. Aside from Chimeras, there is one type..."

"And what would that be?" I questioned, intrigued now.

"Remember that pikmin I mentioned last night? The one who went missing not-too-long ago?"

"Yes," we both said.

"Well, originally she was a blue pikmin. But earlier this season, she was crushed by a Hopper at the water's edge. It only smashed her lower body, so even though she wasn't outright killed, she couldn't walk, and was bleeding heavily. We were sure she was going to die that day, but that's when the white pikmin spotted a Changing Flower on the other side of the pond. To save her life, I carried her to it. You can imagine my surprise when I saw that the Flower was grey..."

"Grey..." I said.

"I had never heard of a grey pikmin, but there was no time for me to ask questions. I chucked her inside, and the Changing Flower spat out a seed that resembled a rock. When I plucked her, I saw why. She _was _a rock now. But with limbs, eyes, and a stem."

"So... grey pikmin are like rocks?" my friend asked.

"We prefer the term 'rock pikmin'. That's more descriptive, I think."

I was used to non-Chimera pikmin being named after their colors, but that seemed fair.

"Here's the neat part, though... I asked if she was alright, but before she could answer, the same Hopper attacked us again. I dodged it, but she didn't, and watching her get flattened a second time was... jarring, to say the least. However, when the Hopper returned to the water, she was perfectly fine! Just half-buried! After a few moments, she pulled herself out of the ground and said, 'I'd say I'm doing pretty good right now'. We couldn't stop laughing..."

His last sentence sounded almost sorrowful.

"So there's a rock pikmin that can't be crushed? Interesting..."

"There's one more!" the female yellow jumped in.

"Ah jeez, not this again..." said the male yellow.

"What? What is it?" my friend asked.

"Don't get her started," said the blue.

"Yeah, don't," said the white with uncharacteristic dryness.

"Oh, come on, you three!" she complained.

"Go on, yellow. We're listening," I assured her.

"A long, long time ago, before I even left my Onion, I climbed a tree and saw _flying pikmin!_"

"Flying pikmin?" we both asked?

"Yup! They were too far away for me to get a good look at them, but they were pink, and had tiny wings. The others think I'm crazy, though..."

"We never said you were crazy, just that it was your imagination," said the male yellow.

"What makes you so sure?"

"Pikmin don't fly! We live on the ground!"

"Every pikmin is unique. Just because all the pikmin _you've _seen are grounded doesn't mean there aren't any flying ones..."

"Alright, enough arguing," said the blue. "It's been a long day. Let's get some sleep.

"Good call..." said the male yellow.

Everybody hunkered down and closed their eyes. Before I did the same, I peaked outside one last time. Demons were already roaming about, and in the distance, I saw two bright dots rising into the sky.

The Orange and Black Onions.

* * *

><p>My slumber was disturbed by the blue shaking my shoulder. Once again, he had woken me up at the crack of dawn.<p>

"Good morning..." I growled. He gave me a cheeky look.

Soon, we were outside, looking for our daily meal. The forest was very quiet; there were a few Demon Harbingers here and there, as well as some Fire Spitters, but they didn't give us much trouble. Eventually, we gave across a patch of Nectar Grass. We didn't hesitate to tear the blades loose and reap the rewards. Every pikmin loves nectar, but I did feel kind of weird drinking it when I already had a flower...

"Does... anyone hear something?" asked the male yellow.

"I do... but I'm not sure what it is," said the female yellow.

I wasn't sure what they were talking about, so I listened more closely. That was when I heard this faint... _jiggling _noise. It sounded kind of like somebody was poking a glob of nectar, only it was more... rhythmic.

We looked around, but saw nothing. Even the white pikmin couldn't see what was making the sound. And yet, it felt so close... Why was that?

That's when it occurred to me to look up.

I sprinted out of the way as... _something _came crashing down. I turned and saw that the other pikmin had been consumed by this strange pile of goo, which was then pulled into the air. What I saw next horrified me.

The see-through body, the spots, the ball of fur...

I had only ever heard stories of this creature, but now I was seeing one for real.

It was the Floating Prison.

And it had trapped my friends.


	12. Bitterness

I was still reeling from shock as the Floating Prison drifted in my direction. Everything seemed to happening in slow motion, until I realized that it was positioned directly above me. I sprang forward and heard its gooey snare hit the ground as I landed on my face.

"What am I going to do?!" I wondered aloud, scrambling to my feet.

The trapped pikmin tried to speak, but their voices were muffled. I could only watch as they swished around in the Prison's body, hopelessly waving their limbs.

I was their last hope for survival. But I was _just one pikmin_. How was I supposed to defeat this thing?

The Floating Prison tried to trap me again, but I dodged it with a roll and took cover under some plants. Pessimistic thoughts started swirling in my head.

_This is hopeless._

_I can't save them._

_They're all going to die._

_I'm all alone._

_I'm just one pikmin.  
><em>

_What can one pikmin do?_

That last statement echoed in my mind. What _could _one pikmin do?

I remembered how the white pikmin and I outwitted a swarm of Spotted Demons. Quite a feat for two pikmin.

But that was two. I was _one. _

I looked up to my friends. Among them, I saw my red friend, struggling inside the Prison's body. Then, almost involuntarily, my mind traveled back to the day we were left behind.

I remembered how I distracted the Crawlers so that he could escape.

How I latched onto one of them and rode it through the air.

How I saved my friend from one that came _this close _to eating him.

How I escaped from a Spotted Demon.

I fought for my life that night. I fought for _our _lives that night. And I did it almost single-handedly...

"No! I'm not going to give up! There has to be a way to save you all!" I said aloud, my voice catching the attention of the Prison. It made its way towards me again, but I fled to a different hiding place before it got too close.

I snuck around the Floating Prison and carefully observed it, using rocks and grass for cover. It hovered around aimlessly, probably searching for me. There was something oddly graceful about its movements. It seemed so... delicate.

I hopped out of my hiding place and threw a pebble at the beast, hoping to hit its eye, but the stone missed and bounced off its jiggly body, landing at my feet. The Prison waved its gelatinous form and was upon me in an instant. I jumped backwards at the last second and watched as it absorbed the pebble into its body.

Then I got an idea.

I made my way to the nearest rock, not bothering to try and get the Prison's attention again because I knew I still had it. I scurried to the very top and waited. Predictably, the Prison floated above me and unleashed its trap. I leaped to the ground and turned back to see the result.

Its snare had stuck to the rock. It tried to pull it back it, but the rock was too heavy.

"Yes..."

It pulled harder and harder until the rock flew into its body, jostling the captive pikmin.

"Yes!"

The Floating Prison hovered shakily, as if it was struggling to stay in the air. Then, in a quick motion, it ejected the rock.

Along with my friends.

"YES!" I cheered, literally bouncing with joy. My happiness was short lived, however, as I realized the Prison was still a threat, and my friends were all lying in a daze.

"Come on, everybody! Get up!" I shouted, pulling the red and the white to their feet. The blue was quick to rise, and the female yellow lifted the male yellow.

Without speaking, we all ran, trying to get as far away from the Prison as we could. I looked back once and saw that it wasn't chasing us. It seemed disoriented.

Once we felt we were safe, we stopped to rest. The blue pikmin didn't hesitate to pat me on the back.

"Now _that _was some creative thinking," he said.

"I would've never thought of that," said the white.

"I'm sure you would have," I said, appreciating the praise.

I looked at the female yellow and saw that she was still carrying the male.

"Is he alright?" I asked.

"He's fine. Getting slammed by that rock just dazed him a bit, is all," she answered.

"I don't ever want to be in that thing again..." the male yellow muttered as the female lowered him to the ground. "It's full of liquid... liquid that you can breathe... but you'd almost wish you were drowning..."

"Oh, come on. It wasn't _that_ bad," the blue laughed.

"Says the blue pikmin..." the yellow grumbled as he wiped the fluid off his mangled ear.

"Oh, don't be cranky just because you're hurt," the female scolded.

My friend approached me.

"Do you thinking that thing was...?" he started.

"The rumored Floating Prison? Yeah, it must've been," I told him.

"Wow. If that's the case, then we would've been stuck in there awhile had you not saved us."

"Well, lesson learned. From now on, one of us will have to keep an eye to the sky," said the blue.

"Good idea," I said.

"Red, can I talk to you alone?" asked the white.

"Um... okay," I said.

We walked a short distance away from the others. They eyed us suspiciously, but didn't follow.

"Do you see what I mean now?" she asked.

"See what?"

"Remember what I said about Onion-dwellers being soulless?"

"Yeah..." I said, already not liking where this was going.

"Well, at first, you and your friend were moaning about having no purpose with your Onion. But now, you're both doing amazing things like fooling a Dirt Dragon and saving us from this 'Floating Prison'..."

"So what's your point?"

"None of this would've happened if you hadn't been left behind! No pikmin can get this clever by staying with an Onion!"

Her comment didn't sit well with me. Not at all.

"Oh, really? And just how do you know that?" I questioned. "Do you speak from experience? Because last I checked, you don't remember your life before becoming a white pikmin. Which means you don't really know what Onion life is like."

"Yes I do! I used to serve the Orange Leader! The Red, Yellow and Blue Onions were with us!"

"They may have been _with _you, but you didn't _live_ in them. You said before that Onion life is soulless, but how can you be sure about that when you have no firsthand experience with such a life?"

"I... Uh..." she stuttered.

"Have you learned these things for yourself, or are you just going with what the blue pikmin tells you?" I pressed.

"Alright, what's going on?" asked the blue, who was suddenly right beside me.

"I don't need firsthand experience!" the white insisted, acting as though the blue had never spoken. "I saw it for myself! We were all soulless when we were with the Onions, but we got smarter and better after we left!"

"No, you got 'smarter and better' after the Orange Leader _taught you to be that way. _That is how the story went, right? Leaving the Onion's got nothing to do with it."

She tried to speak again, but the blue pikmin signaled her to be quiet.

"Forget it, white. He'll learn the truth eventually."

"No, I want to settle this now," I demanded.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was the female yellow.

"Red, we almost died a few minutes ago. Can't this wait?"

"No, it can't. Ever since I joined this group, you pikmin have taken every opportunity to try and turn me against the Onion. I'm getting tired of it."

"Me too," my red friend said bitterly.

"Alright, fine. Let's settle this," said the blue.

"No, let it go," the female yellow commanded. "Life out here is hard enough as is. The last thing we need to be doing is fighting each other."

That's when a thought occurred to me.

"Life _is _hard out here, isn't it? Much harder than it was with the _Onion..._" I said.

"It-... I-..." the blue stuttered, obviously taken aback. _I had him now._

"When you were with the Onion, did you have to worry about starvation?" I asked.

Nobody answered.

"When you were with the Onion, did you always have to wake up at dawn?" I asked.

Still no answer.

"When you were with the Onion, did you have to sneak into a swarm of Demons just to feed yourselves?!" I yelled, pent-up emotions stirring within me.

I looked amongst them, waiting in vain for a response. They either didn't have an answer, or were too afraid to say it, but I didn't care either way. All the frustrations I had been trying to suppress were finally pouring out.

"You say we're better off without the Onion, but how much better is this, really? Life without the Onion isn't liberating..."

I shook my head, allowing my stem to droop.

"...It's a struggle to survive."

I dropped onto my rear, exhausted by all the venting I had just done. Everyone was silent until the blue took in a deep breath and exhaled heavily.

"Red... Listen..." he said.

I glanced at him.

"I know life without an Onion is harder than life with an Onion. But what you have to understand is that-"

He stopped mid-sentence and stiffened his stem.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Do you hear that?" There was slight fear in his voice.

I listened closely. Somewhere in the distance, I could a deep, growling noise. I wasn't sure what it was, but it sounded familiar, and it made me nervous for whatever reason.

The female yellow took a few steps forward, her ears twitching. Then, in an instant, she bolted in our direction.

"Run away! It's a-"

She tripped and stumbled violently across the ground. The male yellow was quick to assist her.

"What is it? What's coming?" asked the blue.

Just then, the plants started to rustle, and an insidious moan bellowed. We stood transfixed as the creature slowly revealed itself to us, causing a loud thud with every step.

The huge jaws, the black body, the red spots... It was the last creature that any pikmin wanted to run into.

"Dark Demon..." I heard myself say.


	13. Servants

My blood ran cold as the Dark Demon charged at us.

"White! You know what to do!" the blue shouted.

The white sprinted up to the Demon and tried to get its attention, but to everyone's surprise, it trudged right past her!

"Hey! I'm back here!" she hollered, grabbing its foot. The Demon kicked her away and continued advancing.

"Everybody scatter!" the blue commanded, a tinge of panic in his voice.

Without thinking, I made a mad dash for some nearby plant cover. I didn't even wonder why the beast hadn't gone after the white; the only voice in my head was that of my survival instinct.

I scurried into a patch of foliage and peeked out. The Dark Demon was coming in my direction!

"Don't freak out… Don't freak out… Don't freak out…" I kept whispering to myself.

The Demon stood before my hiding place and sniffed the ground. I desperately fought the urge to bolt.

It lifted its head slightly and grunted, its glare so powerful that the surrounding plants might as well have not been there. All I could do was stare back and hope that it hadn't spotted me.

After an uncomfortable moment of silence, the Demon slowly shifted its gaze, having seemingly lost interest. A sigh of relief escaped my mouth.

…I was then forced to flee as the Demon came crashing down, crippling the plants that had previously sheltered me. The predator growled lustfully as it got back to its feet, clearly hungry for some red pikmin…

"Red! Over here!" the blue called. He was peeping out of a small burrow, and any reservations I might have had about diving into what could've been some creature's lair failed to manifest as I made a beeline for him. The Dark Demon was practically on top of me the whole time, but I managed to stay ahead of it long enough to reach the hidey-hole. I crashed into the blue on my way in, and the two of us lied still for a few moments as the Demon furiously stomped at the surface. Thankfully, the tunnel didn't seem to be inhabited.

"We might be stuck here for awhile," said the blue. Even after the Demon's tantrum ended, we could still hear it prowling the surrounding area.

"This is all my fault…" I lamented. "If I hadn't made such a ruckus, it wouldn't have found us."

"Well, Dark Demons do cover a lot of ground. It probably would've found us anyway," he said with a surprising amount of sympathy.

"What I'd like to know is why it didn't go after the white pikmin. That made no sense," I said.

"This must not be the first time it's seen a white pikmin," the blue theorized. "It knows better than to eat them."

"Great... We're not just dealing with a Dark Demon, we're dealing with a smart Dark Demon," I groaned.

"It's still not as smart as we are," he assured.

"Tell me something," I said, changing the subject. "How could you honestly prefer life out here than life with the Onion?"

"You still want to talk about this?" he asked.

"Yes. We're not leaving anytime soon, so we might as well."

The blue shook his head.

"Alright, think of it like this… On one hand, you have a Pellet Flower. On the other, you have a Spotted Demon. Which one is safer to attack?" he questioned.

"The Pellet Flower, obviously."

"Right. But if you were to drag one of them to an Onion, which one would yield more seeds?"

"The Demon would."

"Exactly," he said. "The Pellet Flower is more assailable, but the Demon yields more seeds. If you want the greater reward, you need to be willing to take risks."

"So you're using an Onion metaphor to make a case against the Onion? Talk about ironic," I quipped.

"Red…"

"Okay, okay, I see where you're coming from. You think that by roughing it in the forest, you're reaping a greater reward. But I think you're overlooking something."

"Oh? And what might that be?" he probed.

"You and the white insist that such creativity can only occur without an Onion. However, neither of you have explained why that is. Why can it not happen with an Onion? If we're better off on our own, then why do so many pikmin die when they're left behind?"

"Well, a lot of pikmin think that their Onion gives them purpose, and that without it, their lives would be meaningless. I used to think the same thing, back when I served my Onion. Day in, day out, I would gather food, ward off enemies, and make more pikmin, all because I wanted that _thing_ to prosper… But then the Orange Leader arrived and helped me see the big picture."

He paused as if he was expecting me to say something, but I remained silent, so he continued.

"We have so much more potential than tending to an Onion. Even you should realize this by now. But unfortunately, as long as pikmin depend on an Onion for survival, they will never see themselves as anything more than servants."

"So… You left the Onion because…?"

"Because I didn't want to be corrupted again," he finished. "And I'm _never_ going back."

"Corrupted…" I muttered, trying to digest his words.

"Red! Blue! Are you two alright?" a voice called.

"White? Is that you?" I asked.

"Yes, it's me. I can see you through the ground," she explained.

"Is the Demon still up there?" asked the blue.

"No, it wandered off. Let's regroup with the others before it comes back," she suggested.

The blue looked at me.

"Just think about it for now," he said before crawling out of the tunnel. I sighed and followed him. When we reached the surface, there was nobody around but us and the white.

"Where are the others?" I inquired.

"I don't know, but finding them shouldn't be too hard," she said.

"We can't cry out for them, though, or else we might draw that Demon's attention again," the blue warned.

"That shouldn't be a problem, not with my eyesight," the white said confidently. "Come on, they ran in that direction when the Demon attacked."

We ventured back to the spot where we had previously argued, allowing the white to lead the way. Soon, she spied something in the tall grass.

"Hey, you can come out. It's safe now," she said.

My red friend emerged from the blades.

"Oh, good. The gang's all here," he commented. "What went wrong back there?"

"I'll explain later. We still need to find the yellows," said the blue.

"No, we don't. Like I said, the gang's all here," he corrected, pointing skyward. We all looked up and saw the yellow pikmin sitting on a low-hanging twig.

"He was nice enough to toss us up here," the female yellow chuckled.

"I see that nobody got eaten," said the male yellow, apparently less groggy than before.

"Yeah, lucky us. That blasted Demon was smart enough to know that white pikmin are poisonous," said the blue.

"I figured as much. The creatures in this forest are getting dangerously smart," the male yellow mused.

"My thoughts exactly. Come on, let's head back to the nest. We need to discuss a backup plan in case we ever have this problem again," the blue stated.

The yellow pikmin jumped off their twig as the blue directed us back to the tree trunk. Along the way, my red friend spoke to me.

"Is everything okay?" he asked. "You don't look so good."

"Eh, it's nothin'…" I mumbled.

My friend shrugged and didn't pursue the matter further. He had probably assumed that I was still frustrated about earlier, but something else was going on. I was remembering the evening we had been left behind, how we had felt afterwards, and how much had changed since the white pikmin found us.

But what stood out the most was what I had told my friend on our first night alone:

_"A life that isn't serving the Onion is an empty one."_

The blue pikmin was right about one thing: we only saw ourselves as servants.

And if the past two days had taught me anything…

…It was that I could be so much more.


	14. Suspicion

I felt… strange. The other pikmin were sitting in the center of the nest, discussing the Dark Demon problem, but I wasn't listening. I was too busy thinking about the blue's echoing words.

_"As long as pikmin depend on an Onion for survival, they will never see themselves as anything more than servants."_

I didn't want to believe it. I kept trying to convince myself that it didn't need to be true. But it was precisely how I had seen myself. It was precisely how my friend had seen himself. It was precisely how every red pikmin I had ever known had seen themselves.

And yet, in spite of my doubts, I couldn't shake the feeling that it wasn't so all-or-nothing. Why couldn't pikmin be creative _and_ live with an Onion?

I ran that question through my head over and over again, but even THAT felt wrong, in the same sense that asking, "why can't a pikmin be yellow _and_ fireproof," is wrong. But the answer to that question is obvious. The answer to the Onion question… was not.

It was like my feelings were at war with each other, like the blacks and oranges…

…The blacks and oranges...

I winced at the memory of them fighting, and yet, something about it triggered my curiosity. Was it really the Onions' fault? Or was something else going on here?

I had so many questions, and very few answers, but one thing I knew was that I was tired of the other pikmin trying to sway me. The blue showed me the clashing pikmin, the male yellow showed me the trapmin, and the white kept arguing that me being left behind was a good thing. The only pikmin that didn't give me any problems was the female yellow.

…Why was that? It hadn't occurred to me before, but compared to the other pikmin, she was awfully quiet. In fact, I didn't recall ever hearing a single anti-Onion comment from her. It was almost suspicious.

I dwelled on these thoughts for a bit longer before I decided what I wanted to do. It was time to kill two Demons with one bomb-rock.

…But the tricky part was figuring out how to do it without drawing too much attention to myself.

I listened in on the other pikmin's conversation. The blue was saying something about stalking the Dark Demon and memorizing its patrol path, the male yellow was worried about it reproducing, my red friend wanted to kill it somehow, the white wanted to disguise herself as another pikmin to distract it, and the female yellow was sitting silently, apparently having fallen out of the conversation.

How convenient.

"Psst, Yellow," I said, crawling over to her.

"Yes?" she replied, turning her head.

"What do you say you and I go on a foraging trip?" I asked.

"Right now? Why?"

"Well, with that Dark Demon prowling around, I think it would be a good idea to stockpile on food. You know, so we can lay low for awhile if things get rough."

"That sounds like a good idea," said the male yellow, apparently overhearing us. "It's always good to have a backup plan."

"Yeah, exactly," I said.

"I suppose you're right. Why just us, though?" asked the female yellow.

"Two is a good number. It's big enough for us to watch each other's backs, but it's small enough to not attract too much attention," I said. I was impressed by my on-the-spot excuse.

"I guess that makes sense. What do you think, Blue?" she asked.

"I agree that foraging would be a good idea," said the blue. "The rest of us are busy right now, anyway. Don't go too far and you should be fine."

"Will do! Or won't do? Bah, you know what I mean," I said. "Come on, let's go."

I lead the female yellow outside, waving to my red friend as I left. He waved back, but not without throwing a subtle glare at me.

"Anything in particular you'd like to look for?" the yellow asked.

"When I was running away from that Demon, I saw a bunch of Nectar Spirits flying around in a clearing. I think there might be a colony there, and if there is, we can raid them for their eggs and nectar."

"Ooh, lead the way!"

She sounded so excited, and it made me feel bad because she was destined for a rude awakening.

"So tell me," I said as we started walking. "What's your history with the Onion?

There was a brief silence before she asked, "what do you mean by that?"

"Well, when we were hiding from the Demon, the blue told me what his beef with the Onion was and why he left. I'm just a bit curious as to what happened with you and the other yellow, exactly."

"But the blue already went over this," she said, a hint of franticness in her voice. "Remember what he said about the orange leader and-"

"That was different. Back then, he just told me what happened. But today, he told me what it was like from his perspective. It was more personal," I explained.

"I see…" she murmured.

"So…?" I asked, trying to coax her into speaking.

"Mmm… Well…"

"Yes?"

"Life with the Onion wasn't that great," she said, shrugging.

"What was wrong with it?" I pressed.

"Well, I…"

Her stem stiffened.

"Look! A Fire Spitter!" she said, pointing.

I looked ahead and saw that there was, indeed, a Fire Spitter in our path.

"Oh, is that it?" I said, lacking her instinctive fear of the beast. "I'll distract it so you can sneak past."

I did just that, allowing the Fire Spitter to shoot its flames at me while the yellow snuck past. Once she was out of range, I rejoined her.

"Doesn't that hurt?" she asked.

"No, not really. So, about the Onion…"

"Maybe we should worry less about the Onion, and more about staying alert? I don't want anything catching us off guard, and I almost didn't see that Fire Spitter."

"Well, alright then…" I said.

At this point, it was blindingly obvious that she was hiding something, but I decided not to pursue the matter further. All I could do was wonder what happened between her and the Onion, exactly. For all I knew, her story could've been the same as the blue's, but that raised the question as to why she couldn't have just repeated what he said. I couldn't shake the feeling that something else was going on…

We continued traveling for awhile, occasionally having to navigate around Demon Harbingers and Red-Eyed Stabbers. We also encountered a Flower Creeper or two, but I hardly considered those a threat, what with their terrible disguises. Seriously, what did they think they were fooling?

"Red, how much farther is the colony? We've been walking for quite awhile now," said the yellow.

"Oh, we still have a ways to go," I replied.

There was a lengthy silence.

"…Red?" she asked.

"Yes?"

"We're not really going to a Nectar Spirit colony, are we?"

"No, we're not."

She sighed and shook her head.

"Look, I've been to this part of the woods before. I know where you're trying to go. You're making a big mistake," she warned.

"I need to do this," I said.

"Why?" she asked.

"Because I-…"

I was about to tell her, but stopped short when an idea crossed my mind.

"Hey, what do you say we make a deal? I answer your question, and you answer mine?" I offered.

"What question?"

"You know exactly what question I'm referring to."

The yellow scowled.

"…Fine. But you go first," she said.

"Fair enough," I nodded. "Lately, I've been feeling conflicted over whether Onion life is good or bad. I can't make up my mind on my own, and the other pikmin aren't helping, so I'm paying a visit to the Orange and Black Onions."

"What do you think that will accomplish?"

"I don't know, but I don't have any better ideas. I can't just go back to my own Onion to see if it's as good as I remember it. Going to the oranges and blacks is the best I can think of."

"So basically, you're seeking answers from them because you don't have anyone else to turn to?" she asked.

"Yeah, pretty much."

"That's completely irrational! They think their purpose in life is to kill each other!"

"I know it sounds irrational. But I think that if I learn more about them, I'll learn more about myself, too."

"You're one crazy pikmin," she said, grinning.

"You've got that right," I laughed.

"Are you sure want to do this? Because the last time you saw the oranges and blacks…"

"Yes, I'm sure. This is just something I have to do," I insisted.

"Alright. I'm coming with you, then," said the yellow.

"Thank you. I appreciate it."

"So, shall we get a move on?" she asked.

"Not so fast there, Yellow. I believe it's your turn."

Her eye twitched.

"We made a deal," I reminded her.

"Okay, okay…. " the yellow sighed, finally relenting. "Remember all those things the blue said about the Onion being bad, and how pikmin are better off without it?"

I nodded, expecting a rehash of the blue's speech.

"Well, I don't believe in _any_ of that. I left for a completely different reason."


End file.
